FKT attempt? Sounds mad, I am in.
At one point in the planning process, we considered doing this run before volunteering at Southwark junior parkrun, starting at 5 a.m. Thankfully, some of us have families who are not afraid to step in and stop such madness. We ended up setting off from the park after juniors so by the time we got to Wapping station, is was almost 10:30 and getting warm, prompting some of us to question our life choices. But peer pressure never fails, so off we went.
The team (working name “Record Slayers”) was Ben, the captain and mastermind behind the plan (and the only one who actually studied the route and knew where we were going), Gio, the media guy/pacemaker/cheerleader (responsible for taking photos and doing the chatting when the rest of us got way too tired to talk) and Ivi, the woman making this team eligible for the mixed category and the one who complained about the pace being too fast and then sped up even more because why not.
Once we ran through the cobbled streets of Wapping and Limehouse, we got onto the canal and went past Mile End, Gio running in the front like a metronome, periodically sprinting ahead to take some photos of Ben and Ivi hanging in there.
We got to Victoria Park, focusing all of our energy on not stopping at the food market for a quick coffee and donut. There was a race in the park which gave us a little boost before we joined the canal once again. Across the Hackney Wick Bridge we turned left and headed north past Hackney Marshes and across another little bridge which somehow felt like a mountain. The next couple of kilometres were absolutely lovely, running by the water surrounded by greenery.
Once we hit the Lea Rowing Club we knew we were in the business end of our run. As we trotted along the canal, we got a company — a boatload of rowers gliding alongside us, their coach’s encouragement ringing loud and clear above the water.
At two kilometres to go, a quick reminder that if the kids at juniors can do it, we can probably do it too. And then there it was, the Tottenham Hale Lock, in all its beauty. A slight confusion over where the exact end of the route was, so we ran a tiny bit extra just to be on the safe side. Stopped right by a massive dog poop, but hey, we did it and that’s what counts!
We carried our own water and didn't take any nutrition.